


The Silver Princess

by Anonymous



Series: A Song of Swaps [4]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Dysfunctional Family, Dysfunctional Relationships, F/M, Gen, R Plus L Does Not Equal J
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-31
Updated: 2019-10-18
Packaged: 2020-07-28 03:17:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20057149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: She is born admist the salt and smoke, the Princess of Sumerhall. She is Rhaenyra Targaryen, firstborn of Aerys and Rhaella. She is the last hope of her dynasty, wed to her male cousin to secure the succession. She may not be the prince who was promised, but she will most certainly bring him into this world.The world manages to survive King Aerys only having two surviving daughters. Until there at last comes a son, twenty years too late.Or: A genderswap AU where Aerys and Rhaella have two daughters and one very belated son.





	1. The Princess of Summerhall

**Author's Note:**

> Aerys, female Rhaegar, and general Targaryen shittiness ahoy, folks. Read at your own discretion.

_"-what are you do-"_

_"The king is dead, the king is-"_

_"-er Duncan, take my Rhaella and run!"_

_"...easy there, little dragon, easy there. Everything is going to be just-"_

Her world is smoke and screams, fire and blood, an agonizing pain and then endless darkness she knows must be death.

Then, Rhaella awakes. Her middle throbs and her eyelids are heavy as lead, but she's _alive. _The blurry shapes of her attendants murmur and press around her, but Aerys breaks his way through first. He falls to her side to pepper her forehead in kisses, like she once did as children when that summer fever nearly took him. His hot tears fall like rain upon her cheeks. Beyond him is Mother, with a bundle in her arms.

Instinctively Rhaella's hands fly to her distended middle, where her babe had kicked and tumbled so long. Her last sight, before losing consciousness, had been that pale, squalling shape held up by the maester, blurred by smoke and watery eyes.

"My baby!" she cries, voice cracking from scorch and thirst. She grits her teeth and forces herself to sit, reaching out for the precious bundle in her mother's arms. "Give me my baby!"

"Shush," Mother soothes, as she leans in closer. "She's right here, Rhaella. A bit early, but a perfectly healthy little princess."

Rhaella refuses to believe so until she sees her child for herself. Aerys tries to support her, but she holds their babe, _her _babe, without shaking. From blankets of red and black peeps a small, perplexed face already with a downy head of silver-blonde hair. Her eyes are blue, deep as the sea. Rhaella scarcely hears her mother promise the babe's eyes will one day spring up purple. Her daughter is already perfect.

"I named her for you, Rhaella," Aerys volunteers eagerly. "She'll rule one day, alongside her brother."

Her daughter is not merely called Rhaella. No. Nor is she simply Rhae, like their great-aunt, or Rhaelle for their aunt. She is _Rhaenyra _Targaryen, for the one woman of their line to have ever tried sitting the Iron Throne in her own right. She is named for the defiant warrior queen Aerys has long admired, the same the realm now curses as the whore of Dragonstone and Maegor with tits.

But the thought flies from her head, when Rhaella remembers the fire. This cramped little chamber is not one of Summerhall's grand quarters, but a room from the closest knight's holdfast.

Rhaella refuses to give up her babe, when the casualties of Summerhall are listed. Gone is Uncle Duncan. Gone is Grandpa Egg. Gone is brave Ser Duncan, who carried her in his strong arms from that burning nightmare and into the cool night air, who saved her from...

Rhaella thought she cried all her tears away the night she was wed to her brother.

When she hears Grandmother too perished before Ser Duncan could rescue her too, the scar is sundered. Rhaella weeps hot, furious tears.

Betha Blackwood alone had raged against wedding her two grandchildren to ensure that damned prophecy came to fruition. Betha Blackwood, who had demanded Ser Duncan to take Rhaella and _run, _no matter who burned and died behind them.

"The eggs," Rhaella rasps out.

Neither her mother nor brother speak. Their silence is enough.

Seven dragon eggs, there had been. The lives of a king and his firstborn could not even hatch one. They had not been the intended sacrifices, should Grandpa Egg's 'minor' offering of blood have been insufficient.

Rhaella and her little girl remain.

* * *

Pale and frail, Jaehaerys Targaryen is still the last son of Aegon left standing, and so king he is crowned. He wears the iron crown of his grandfather Maekar, for the golden band of Aegon III melted with the fifth Aegon and his head trembles beneath the ponderous crown of Aegon IV.

He is a stopgap measure for the Iron Throne, and all the realm knows it. His brief reign knows both the last gasps of the Blackfyre Rebellion and bloodshed in the west as the Reynes and Tarbecks near split the Lannister regime apart, before young Tywin exterminates them both.

Though the realm hemorrhages, and her father's ineffective small council feud and flounder, her father's reign are Rhaella's last three years of peace. After her daughter is born, all the maesters insist on rest and recovery, that Aerys avoid her bed at all costs. Their orders often come with narrowed eyes and pointed comments that suggest it is perhaps unwise for a girl to be forced to wed at three and ten, and for her body to then carry a pregnancy through that same year to become a mother at mere four and ten. They say it's a miracle mother and child survived at all.

While her father fights to keep alive and her brother to learn kingship in his stead, Rhaella is left in relative quiet on Dragonstone. It is Queen Shaera that must reap the consequences of bedding her sickly brother for love, to remain at his side and fend off the wolves of court through favors and politics.

Rhaella tries hard to train the court to call her little girl _Nyra, _to give her as much of a unique identity as her legacy will allow. Poor Aerys cannot fathom why Rhaella would not be flattered to have their little girl named after both herself _and _their family's only independent queen. So Rhaella smiles prettily, counts backwards, and instead settles for _little dragon _and _Rhae, _when she must use a name at all.

True to Shaera' prediction, little Rhae's infant blue eyes settle as deep indigo. Unlike her mother and grandmother before her, Rhae is not an ethereal little waif, but tall for her age. Not that Rhae grows sunburned from playing with the castle servants and riding Dragonstone's scruffy ponies, as Rhaella once had. Her daughter hides away in the library. Even before she can read, she's wrenching books near big as she is open to stare intently at their illustrations. By the time the raven comes announcing Jaehaerys' inevitable passing, Rhae already knows all her letters, and is tearing through whatever simple book her septa can put in front of her.

So ends their quiet sanctuary. Where the new Queen Mother is allowed a graceful retirement, the Princess of Dragonstone becomes Queen Rhaella Targaryen. Now a woman grown, with a healthy daughter of three to prove her fertility, the maesters stop gently suggesting she return to her brother's bed but _insist _upon it. For the sake of the realm, a family one male away from extinction.

Rhaella tries. She must, for Rhae's sake. Every year past is another year's gap between her and a brother-husband, another year for the realm a princess precedent has long assured can never inherit the throne on her own.

The year after her father's death, Rhaella suffers her first miscarriage, and her second the year after that. Three years of respite had mattered little, when her womb had been scarred and warped before it could fully mature.

Her and Aerys try to find hope, that the miscarriages at least proof she can still conceive. Rhaella is not yet twenty, but already with one healthy child. She has years and years for a whole brood to follow.

When Rhae turns seven, a blessed nameday, Rhaella has a brand new silver harp made for her to replace her battered old beginner's instrument. Aerys deems her tall enough for a proper horse, and buys her a silver sandsteed from Starfall, swift as a shooting star. Most pointedly, he does not declare her Princess of Dragonstone, not like Daenerys Targaryen had been by the first Jaehaerys two hundred years before. Rhaenyra is a princess, but _not _a future queen as her namesake was.

Rhae loves both gifts, for though she loves music she is as skilled a rider as she is a harpist.

However, both are second in her heart by the battered book lovingly granted by her grandmother. Rescued from Summerhall, it is a text on dragons and dreams and even with excerpts from Daenys the Dreamer. It confirms so much of what Rhae has already suspected and only inflames her desire to discover _more._

Perhaps it is no small coincidence that book is the last gift Rhae shall ever receive from her grandmother. Not a year later, Shaera Targaryen is dead, eaten alive by the tumors the maesters fought a losing war against.

Rhaella is the one Targaryen left in King's Landing when her mother finally passes, for Aerys had taken Rhae and half his court with them to the westerlands. They are just embarking on their journey home when a second raven reaches the king.

It is the first time Aerys breaks down before his court, in a tumult of joy and rage and sorrow. At last, Rhaella has birthed a son.

The boy was stillborn.

The little babe, who never breathed, is burned with all the honors befitting a son of the Iron Throne. Upon his urn is inscribed _Jaehaerys Targaryen, _a grand dynastic name for the lineages and little else. Had he been born a girl, he would have been named for the Queen Mother instead.

Two years after Jaehaerys comes a daughter, born squalling. Aerys, only slightly miffed at her gender, still crows over the birth of a healthy child. He proclaims her the most beautiful babe he has ever laid eyes upon. With that in mind, he names her Daenaera, exalted even in childhood for her beauty.

The babe Aerys intends to be her brother-husband is conceived mere weeks later, after Maester Pycelle approves his return to the marriage bed. For six blessed months, the gods smile on them.

Then comes the morning when a shrieking nursemaid discovers Daenaera burning with fever. Within the week, the Stranger comes twice.

* * *

_"This a joyous day," the midwife assures her, over and over again. "You'll be a big sister soon."_

_Rhaella is one and ten, made to stand at her mother's bedside and pass rags when it's demanded of her. Over a decade now, her parents have tried for a proper brood of dragons. With the third one imminent, both have demanded her to be there to witness the birth. This shall be her burden too, when her moon's blood comes._

_But the air reeks of iron and rot. The walls are black and red, not from draped Targaryen banners, but from shadow and flame. Despite her screams, Mother is gleeful. Her face is as pale and withered as it was in her last few months of life, as she bleeds black and viscous. _

_At last the nursemaids bring her child into the world. And it is an abomination._

_"Monster, monster!" screams the long dead ghost of Queen Rhaenyra. "Get out, get out, GET OUT!"_

_"This is a joyous day," the midwife tells her. "You're a mother now."_

_Then it is Rhaella who's lying in the birthing bed, her life's blood pouring forth over the bed and all the Seven Kingdoms. Mother's proud, gaunt face looms over her. The thing in her arms is stunted and sexless beneath the waist, its scaled skin sloughing off._

_"The dragon has three heads," Shaera Targaryen coos._

_But the dragon is dead, dead, de-_

Numbed by blood loss and milk of the poppy, Rhaella is bemused to wake a second time from what she had believed certain death. Aerys, who is looming over a terrified maid, immediately returns to her bedside. He sweeps an arm over her as he presses in close.

"The child," she says tiredly. 

Aerys lays a single kiss upon her brow. "Stillborn," he explains. The maid pales white as milk beneath his mild gaze, as she too understands. It'll be her tongue or her life if she doesn't.

This is not the first monster their family has hidden. Even when sons married outside the blood, their sisters and grandmothers had carried the lore, so that it might never resurface as a nasty surprise. Horrific, yes, but never without warning.

The child is already ashes. Its tiny body, shrouded in silks of red and black the moment it was pulled forth, burned in the yard minutes minutes later and without ceremony.

Four and a half moons gone, the pregnancy is too far gone to be considered a miscarriage. The chronicles regard only a stillbirth, name and sex unknown.

After some deliberation, the nameless urn is interred alongside those of Jaehaerys and Daenaera. It is just as much their child as the others are, after all.

"The Mother smiles on us," Aerys tells her later, when her moon's blood returns, like it never had for their mother. "We'll still have our son."

Rhaella bites her lip hard enough to bleed. She cannot refuse him, she _can't, _but she refrains long enough to press, "And Rhae?"

Aerys grumbles when she pulls her neck away from his sucking kiss, but relents, "Yes, yes. One of Steffon's boys will do. Closest thing she can get to a proper husband, these days."

The Queen smiles.

* * *

Not a month later, the raven Steffon and Cassana have long suspected arrives in Storm's End. Both of their sons yet remain unattached, despite the flurry of offers that have already come in from across the stormlands and the neighboring realms. When the succession of the Seven Kingdoms may be at stake, one must keep their options open.

Their swift reply to King's Landing for further discussion on potential betrothal arrangements goes unanswered. So does their second letter, and the third, and the one sent to Dragonstone. When Steffon tactfully brings up the matter of Rhae's hand in person to his king, Aerys' answer is jovial noncommittal. His fickle mind has already turned away from a looming succession crisis and back to another revolutionary plan to transform the realm, until he grows bored of that too.

Only the following year, does a concrete proposal reach Storm's End, for Rhaella's latest miscarriage has vexed Aerys so. Robert is nine, and Stannis only seven. Princess Rhaenyra is already two and ten, without a formalized future or a single surviving sibling.

"Robert is brave and bold," Steffon points out. "He's good at making friends, and stands up for what he thinks is right. Patience and restraint will come with age."

"He's the heir to Storm's End," Cassana argues. "Stannis is a quiet little boy, but so _dedicated. _He has the mindset for governance."

But not the charisma, they both well know. Stannis was born to be a castellan, a second-in-command, an Orys to an Aegon. Circumstances will forge him into either a lord or king.

"Aegon the Tyrant, Jaehaerys the Brief, and Aerys," Steffon murmurs. His good cousin is still without a solid reputation, but despite his good moods, there are still the worrying storms. "The realm has not had a _strong _king. Not since Maekar."

And then there is the princess. The beautiful, bookish princess who plays harps and has half the realm already fighting for her favor. All silk, and no steel.

For the good of their boys, the good of the realm, they choose the strong king, the one that will make his kingdom love him and his queen.

That afternoon two ravens fly from Storm's End. The first heads for King's Landing, where Robert is tentatively confirmed as Rhaenyra's betrothed, though his rights to the stormlands will not be revoked unless the marriage occurs. The second heads for the Vale, so that Stannis may foster for Jon Arryn and, perhaps, grow up seeing Elbert Arryn and Eddard Stark like brothers.

* * *

Rhae is two and ten when her cousin Robert is confirmed as her betrothed. He is a boisterous boy, big for his age, and still sore that she's yet taller than him. King he shall be, as the fates of other potential female heirs have made so clear. And so Rhae must be his queen. Without her, the blood of Jaehaerys and Shaera lose the Iron Throne entirely.

Father is of course hellbent on fighting fate, no matter how futile. He refuses to name either Rhae or Robert his heir, and so there is no official Prince or Princess of Dragonstone.

There will, however, once more be a Summerhall. With confirmation of a betrothal Father orders the old ruins razed, so that a newer, smaller keep might be raised in its place. Rhae mourns the loss of such fallen grandeur. She loves to walk among the ruins, where the ghosts of the past hang so heavy. Her songs never sound as sad nor as sweet when the melodies do not bounce off the charred walls. When she sleeps beneath the moon and stars, her dreams gain potency, and the hazy visions of her promised son and the red sword to come grow sharp.

"Don't look so sad about old stones, sweetling," Father tells her. "I'm burying all the ghosts so that you and Steffon's boy have a seat of your own. He's giving up Storm's End for you, after all."

Summerhall should have been her tomb. But now the tears are long dried and the flames turned to ash. Her son must be been admist the salt and smoke, above the eternal fires of Dragonstone.

The year after the miscarriage that sealed Rhae's future marriage, Mother conceives again. Father is cruel that way, forcing his own sister-wife to bury child after child because he is not satisfied with the one the gods have given him. Rhae is a maid of three and ten when her poor, doomed little sister is born. Unlike full-term, healthy Daenaera, she comes two moons premature, in the year's dying days.

Even Father, hopelessly optimistic, realizes this daughter is doomed. His name of Aerea is a poisoned gift, for the timid little princess that grew so strong was in the end burned from the inside out. Aerea Targaryen scarcely lives to see the new year, before she joins the rest of Rhae's siblings in the catacombs beneath Dragonstone.

After Aerea, Rhae blossoms into a true woman, a sure sign the time has come to bow to the next generation. Father refuses to entertain talk of seeing the marriage to Robert through. Whenever someone dares suggest it, his temper grows shorter, his fits of pique more frequent. Despite Rhae's frigid expectation, court backs off from forcing their king to take action, not that their fear makes his madness much recede.

No. It is Jaehaera, born two years after Aerea, that fully returns Father to himself. He loves her more than he had ever had Aerea or the son he had never met, or long-lost Daenaera. He takes her to court in his arms, sits the Iron Throne with her in his lap, and interrupts rule with her every mewl. He sings Jaehaera lullabies Rhae has only heard from Mother. He promises Jaehaera the sun and the moon and the stars, all the glories of Volantis.

Jaehaera dies the same year. First her nursemaid is beheaded for poisoning her princess. Then Father's mistress and her whole family are tortured to death for the murder. He never lays blame upon the Stranger's feet, or himself for forcing the babe's existence in the first place.

When Rhae is a woman fully grown, she goes before the Iron Throne herself to plead her love of Robert and wish to once more make their families one, so that they might grant their king a whole brood of doting grandchildren. Once Rhae could play her father's heartstrings like her harp, but now his heart is a strange, twisted thing familiar with one beat and alien the next. Still, she reasons and begs and fakes tears, to stir whatever is left of her true father in Aerys' heart.

He resists, at first, for to surrender to her is to surrender to Steffon and Robert. Still, with time and relentless patience, Rhae wears him down. Slowly but surely.

Her progress is all for nothing, when Mother falls pregnant _again._

"My seventh child!" King Aerys proclaims to the court, when his queen's pregnancy is seven months gone. The nameless stillborn counts now, while the brief miscarriages do not. "At last, the gods bless me with a son! I declare him as Viserys Targaryen, the Prince of Dragonstone!" He has his puppet of a septon anoint Mother's rounded belly in the holy oils, so that he might lay a silver circlet upon the curve.

The realm murmurs, but reluctantly accept the announcement. There is extremely ancient precedent, of regency councils declared for posthumous heirs yet unborn when their fathers rode off to die in battle in the ages of the fractured kingdoms. Perhaps this child _is _a boy that could be named Viserys, who shall automatically be his father's heir.

And then laugh behind their King's back, when his Viserys is instead born a Viserra. Tywin Lannister quietly cancels the tourney planned in Lannisport. Aerys, in a sudden fit, orders all the gifts of the Westerosi lords burned for fear they might be sabotaged.

Viserra is small, but robust. That does not stop Aerys from ordering food tasters to also suckle from her nursemaid, a round-the-clock guard around her cradle, and refusing even Rhaella to be alone with her. She is still his child, after all, and losing the last daughter damn near broke him.

After a year to give Father the time to settle, Steffon once more proposes the marriage.

Aerys at last accepts, as Rhae inevitably knew he would.

She is mildly, but pleasantly, surprised Viserra is still around to witness it too. If Father would have allowed her to attend the ceremony.

* * *

The royal wedding takes nearly a year to plan. Despite the preparation the Red Keep still inundated with guests, with lesser lords spilling out into the city's more luxurious inns and neighboring holdfasts outside the city. The goldcloaks, even with swollen numbers, still struggle to contain the throngs of smallfolk that have come to catch a glimpse of their Silver Princess and her Stormlord. They've come for the ceremony and the celebrations and, perhaps, the controversy.

The Great Sept of Baelor is crammed to capacity, with some guests gladly taking a space, standing and squeezed, if only to witness the grandest royal wedding since Rhaelle Targaryen wed Ormund Baratheon.

The bards have long sung of the Silver Princess' beauty. Today they will claim her radiant as the Maiden made flesh. When the light of the rainbow glass catches her gown, samite and cloth-of-silver shimmer like starlight. The brilliance of her gown is almost enough to rival her lustrous silver-blonde tresses. Her eyes, deep as indigo, are accentuated by the amethysts at her neck. Most striking of all, however, is her expression. The Silver Princess does not brim with nervous anticipation or beam with joy. Rhaenyra Targaryen stands serene as a goddess, one hewn from ivory.

Down the aisle strides Robert Baratheon, vigorous despite his mostly black garb and the solemn occasion. Newly six and ten, his chiseled features and the muscles rippling beneath his doublet make the young and wistful sigh. He already stands well over six feet, and would tower over his bride if she were not six feet herself.

To much relief and some disappointment, there is no sullenness in Robert when he grandly whisks off Rhaenyra's bridal cloak for himself, draping his shoulders in the red dragon on black. It is not an uncommon Andal practice, when the son of a lesser house weds an heiress of greater stature. Even the domains of House Baratheon cannot match all Seven Kingdoms or the claim he holds through the blood of his royal grandmother. So does the Stormlord become Robert Targaryen, Prince of Dragonstone, and Rhaenyra his Princess.

The ceremony afterward is rowdy but uneventful, for an even its size. Perhaps Robert is a bit too boisterous with the serving maids, but does nothing _untoward. _Beneath the eyes of his parents, he even limits his wine, and of course makes his bride the star of his evening. As always, Rhae rises to the occasion, charming the crowd with her grace and poise. If Robert is a lord's best friend, then Rhae is their thoughtful princess, who always surprises them with the personal questions she can ask about their lands and families, even for those who rule far beyond the crownlands.

Most of the night's entertainment revolves around the younger Baratheon brother. Stannis, new heir to Storm's End, tries his hardest not to grit his teeth as the most eligible maidens of the realm proceed to throw themselves upon him. Guests place bets on which one will finally crack his defenses - perhaps buxom Janna Tyrell or the little lioness, already love and with a father who shits gold to boot. The Tully sisters have longer odds. The scowling she-wolf dragged down from the north has odds longer still, longer than even those of Jon Arryn's gaggle of Waynwood nieces.

With the maids of five Great Houses fawning over the Baratheon boy, a few curious eyes glance to a serene Elia Martell, who pointedly hangs back by her family. News of negotiations between Sunspear and Hightower is not common knowledge until the end of the night.

Then, there is the bedding.

* * *

Stoic as a statue, Rhae scarcely blinks as lords and knights tear away her finery. They have little chance, before Ser Arthur Dayne and Ser Oswell Whent close ranks around her. Beneath the fierce gaze of the Lord Commander himself, even the drunkest hands draw back, as Ser Gerold and his Kingsguard escort their princess onward.

Robert, of course, revels in his last moments of freedom. He smirks at the women who paw at his clothes, who linger long enough to brush across his chest or give his arm or leg a testing squeeze. Even some of Stannis' gaggle pull away for a fondle.

Not the little ones, of course. The Tully girls have faces red as their hair. The Stark pup rolls her eyes and turns away. Most amusingly of all, little Cersei sizes him up like a prize stallion, glancing back at Stannis to gauge what his shirt and scowl might hide.

Robert could soak up at the attention all night, though he lets the crowd slowly draw him down the halls. When he catches his father's stormy eye, he picks up the pace a bit.

When the doors to his chambers slam shut, cutting off the light and the laughter, the sudden silence falls over him like a tomb. Pale and ethereal, his wife waits in the dark.

The words Robert has long planned unravel in his head, as all the long lessons drilled into him by his father turn to smoke. It's hard to picture this woman before him as anything but the awkward, coltish girl who would squirrel away in the library with her books and candles when they were forced to visit.

"Rhae," he starts at last, because that is the only name he has for her. "I-"

One long finger, calloused from the harp, falls across his lips. Rhae presses a kiss to his jawbone, takes his hand, and leads him to bed. Robert is bemused to follow.

He reminds himself, over and over, Rhae is no eager wench or worldly whore. She is his cousin, his princess, and in the moonlight she looks fragile as Rhaella. So Robert bites his lip hard enough to bleed, as he holds back his hands and keeps his bulk from her, to treat her as glass.

Though her face is pale and distant as the moon, Rhae _burns, _and her touch is fire. Whenever he tries to play the gentleman, she snarls and pulls him down with want, with _need._ Her efforts are heroic, considering her experience must all come from lurid Lysene books and second-hand knowledge of her maids.

Robert craves _more. _She is a dragon. He wants her claws raking his back, her fangs on his neck to mark, to claim her king as a queen should.

But the flames in her gze are not passion. It is something distant, something _other._

Though her face is Rhaella's, her eyes are Aerys'.

Perturbed, Robert rolls away from her when spent, his satisfaction withering even when Rhae rolls to press her breasts into his shoulder.

"I- We both know I'll be a shit king," he croaks.

"You were not born to be a king, but you were born to sire one."

Robert looks into the eyes of his queen, one ready to rule no matter what the crown laws say on the matter. "And that's my part, then?" he asks bitterly. "To sit at your side to repeat your every word, and fuck you when you'd prefer a babe?"

"I work to make the people love me, because I must. All you can do is make them love you, because that is who you are." Rhae wraps a pale, burning arm around him. "Be yourself. Have your friends and hunts and your melees. Show that you care, that you're a man, and they'll fall into place. That is why there is a Hand of a King and a small council, to act where the king cannot."

She is beautiful as a state, and near as unfuckable. "I'll be no Aegon the Unworthy, but I'm still a man, Rhae. I can't just... lock away desires like you can." _If you feel them like a woman or, seven hells, even a man should._

"You are the blood of the storm," Rhae states neutrally. "Be the storm, when you must. So long as you are discrete, and they do not blow back upon us, your outlets are your own. I am but your queen, after all."

Robert jolts at the venom in her last breath, the closest he has ever heard to bitterness from her. Then he remembers the royal mistresses he had once heard as rumor, and Rhae lived until her father had tortured the last.

"And I am your king. I put your cloak upon my shoulders, so that I might become champion to you and our children. I'm yours, Rhae, and I'll protect you with all that I have."

His queen smiles her sad, secret smile. "They'll need you, Robert, more so than I." She takes his hand to lay upon her flat belly, still sticky with his seed.

Robert remains gallantly still.

Stormlords don't shiver.

Neither do princes.


	2. The Princess of Dragonstone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Princess of Summerhall claims her rightful title.

Robert knows perfectly well why his wife loves dull, dreary Dragonstone. It's as much a relic of doomed old Valyria as she is. He can't walk to the privy without passing at least three things of historical important, whether it's the window gazing out to where the first Rhaenyra was burned alive by Sunfyre or the corner where Lord Aerion is rumored to have conceived Orys Baratheon in. There's dragon towers and dragon doorways, so many that surely no one would mind if he took his hammer to a few.

"Wouldn't your books be better in a castle where they won't mold over if left out overnight?" Robert asks his wife, half in jest and half in earnest curiosity. Rhae's biggest personal expense is the staff and resources needed to keep Dragonstone's library from being consumed by the castle's very air.

Rhae smiles thinly, the light never reaching her eyes. It's only a moon into their marriage, then, and they're still trying for their first.

When Rhae announces her moon's blood stopped, Robert whoops for all the damned stone dragons to hear. His stoic princess squeals in surprise when his first act as an expectant father is to spin her around. He grins down at her, and steals her complaint with a kiss. Perhaps there is love here yet to find.

As the honeymoon period wears thin, and the news grows stale, so does Robert's elation. Rhae no longer steals into his bed. Her doors stay closed at night, for her maternal history certainly mean her and her babe can't be risked. In the day, when she deigns remember him, their time together is only filled with songs and signs of what is to come. All over the babe that's yet barely a bump in her belly.

By the end of the first trimester, Robert is near climbing Dragonstone's walls when the maesters declare the worst of the danger has passed. So Rhae releases him from his duties.

Not truly free, but only a lengthened chain, Robert enjoys what liberty he can. He sets sail for the stormlands immediately, avoiding the capital entirely. Sure, King's Landing has the kingswood and people that aren't reverential of the Targaryens, but it also has his good-father. Robert pities poor Rhaella and lonely little Viserra, truly, but to visit without his wife at his side is to try Aerys' eye upon him. He is a brave man, recklessly so, but even stags don't go poking dragons in their den.

Of course his tour takes him to Storm's End. It was home once, before obligations forced him to set his inheritance and his very name aside. Little Renly is ecstatic to see him. Despite her veiled disappointment, so is Mother, and Father to a lesser extent. The only one that can't be courteous to House Baratheon's prodigal sons is unsurprisingly Stannis. Robert doesn't take it personally. Stannis has a tendency to project his own frustrations upon him.

"So, Stannis, have you picked a girl yet?" Robert tries over supper, for at least the second son of Storm's End has the privilege to pick his bride, and the rumors have flown faster than the ravens. "Not that you're in a rush to yet, mind. Some of those girls are still growing into themselves-"

To his left Stannis grits his teeth, for even the heir of Storm's End must give the visiting Prince of Dragonstone the seat of honor. "I have chosen Lyanna Stark. She is the most diplomatic choice."

_The most palatable, you mean, _Robert reflects. His little brother has always been baffled by the fairer sex. No small wonder mature, canny Janna Tyrell honed in on Elbert Arryn instead after the first hours of the wedding. "I know you and that Eddard Stark became good friends up in the Eyrie, Stannis. But isn't his sister a bit, er..." _Horse-faced? Mannish? Question your every statement the last time you spent time together?_

"She was honest with her intentions and so we came to an understanding," Stannis says curtly, ears pink.

Lyanna Stark despised the betrothal near as openly as Stannis himself, then. Misery loves company.

"It is a very strategic match, Stannis," Father says approvingly. "Few houses can command the age and lineage of House Stark, and none the size of their lands and untapped potential."

"It is also a wise match," Mother adds, more sagely. "Marriages must be built on more than alliance alone. Stannis already knows the Stark family well through Eddard. He has an honest indicator of Lyanna herself, more so than one can get through letters and supervised meetings."

Robert forces himself to return her smile. He remembers those long, agonizing visits to Rhae on Dragonstone all too well. More frequent were the long letters Maester Cressen forced him to sit through and read. Rhae's penmanship is a work of art, too elegant to easily read, and as a child she loved sending elaborate discussions of whatever arcane subject she was exploring at the time. Robert's eyes had hurt almost as much as his hands, for Maester Cressen had forced him to send replies back just as long.

When his welcome in Storm's End swiftly wears thin, Robert rides for Summerhall. In comparison to the grander royal seats, the little holdfast is small and idyllic, homey in a way desolate Dragonstone can never be. Most importantly, there are no dragons in residence, and the seat is Robert's own through right of his wife.

The local nobility is eager to indulge their prince. Robert runs wild as only a prince kept restrained since boyhood can. He spends many blissful days thundering through untamed woods and warm nights with wine and women in taverns and knights' halls alike.

All too soon, his reprieve is over.

As Rhae's seventh moon of pregnancy rounds into the eight, Robert rides for a harbor, because gods be damned if he's going to miss the birth of his firstborn child. He stops for only one brief hunting detour, for Rhae's last letter has teasingly complained of how their babe craves quail. He flushes out as many as he can, to keep from Storm's End to Dragonstone.

Robert does not land empty-handed, for the stormlords and Summerhall's own few vassals have showered him with with gifts for his bride and their babe. Among them are the furs of a dozen beasts he slew himself, transformed into luxurious blankets and bedding to keep the cool night air from a babe's sensitive skin.

Rhae receives him graciously, radiant as the Mother. The sight of her, heavy with his child, stirs Robert, no matter how hard he tried to purge such passions out on that boat wench before disembarking.

Dragonstone celebrates that night for its prince's safe return and the imminent birth of his child. That night, when Robert fully intends a private celebration of his own with a new maid, his hand is instead snagged by his wife's when she declares her early retirement for the evening.

Intrigued, Robert follows her to chambers he has not seen since soon after their child was conceived. Rhae pushes him onto her bed. He hungrily fixates on breasts round as the moon, as the dragon bears down upon him.

"Do you have any idea," she hisses into his ear, "how hot a dragon burns with, without a storm to quench the fires?"

"No," Robert admits with a grin. "Why don't you show me?"

His princess does. With the babe, there is only so much she will allow, before her fingers rake down his back and she nips his ear to halt him. Robert works around her queenly commands, smirking with every shriek and scream he steals from her. He's never expected the marriage bed to challenge him so. Such creativity, he reserves for the whores.

After a few blissful weeks, the best of their marriage, Rhae retreats into confinement. If Robert near crawled the walls before, this time he's pacing the shore of the island.

Their child comes on a cloudless noon, when the sun burns high and bright on the last warm autumn day of the season. The babe is hearty and hale, big and robust. She is placed into Robert's arms still covered in unmentionable bits from the birth.

"Visenya," Rhae declares in weary triumph.

Baffled, man and babe stare at each other. Then she squirms and lets out a wail, loud as the storm.

Robert loves her like he has never loved before. Even bloodied and squashed, she is beautiful, and only grows more so by the day.

Visenya is such a presumptuous name, even for such an opinionated babe. He and the rest of Dragonstone swiftly take to calling her Nya.

By the time Nya is to come to court, she has sprouted a head of coal-black hair and her eyes have settled on Robert's deep, stormy blue. Robert is near bursting with pride, when he and Rhae can last triumphantly present her to their family.

Of course Robert's own parents adore her immediately. Cassana's arms itch to take her, but even they must wait for the royal grandparents to have the honor first. Even Stannis can't find fault in his flawless little niece. When she smiles guilelessly at him, he smiles right back.

"Your Grace," Rhae prompts, as Aerys beholds the babe with only quiet disdain.

"How beautiful," Rhaella cooes, taking her granddaughter. Nya easily settles in her arms. "Look, Aerys, how much she looks like Grandmother already. Her hair was black and sleek like a raven's wing, too. Such a pity neither of our parents passed it down to us."

Aerys' unkempt face twists into a jealous sneer. "It's an even bigger pity, sister, that our daughter has your same luck when it comes to bearing sons."

Beneath his father's gaze, Robert curls his fists until they throb. Better his palms bleed than bash his good king's head in, than to plunge the throne-room into chaos with his whole family to suffer for it.

* * *

Stubborn to a fault, Robert and Rhae do not retreat early to Dragonstone. They thoroughly enjoy the festivities in King's Landing, to let three doting grandparents enjoy their firstborn grandchild. Viserra demands to hold her niece, even if Rhaella or Robert hang nearby to support them both. Rhae publicly composes an ode to Princess Visenya Targaryen, laden with the promises of glories yet to come.

When they return to the relative refuge of Dragonstone, Rhae demands her second head. Robert gives her all he has, because the spite has made him wroth, and it feeds Rhae's in turn.

He does not retreat to Summerhall, this time. Nya is little yet. He bursts with pride when she first crawls and then toddles after him, babbling all the time to be swung around his arms, and screaming down a storm when he doesn't oblige her quickly enough. Robert finds peace with his little princess, more than he can with a dozen girls scattered across the island. She mellows the tumult in his heart, until the castle walls don't press so tightly around him.

The fire that kindled in Rhae with Nya returns full force when expecting their second. Their days almost always have one stag-hunt, where the dragon seeks out the one who can slake her. Robert turns it into a game, because his wife is not one for games otherwise. With her in his bed some moments fly by, though the days drag on Dragonstone as they would not in Summerhall.

Late in the year, when winter is in full force, Rhae goes into labor. Their second daughter is born on a cold, quiet morning. She is born smaller than Nya, with finer features, and just as beautiful in her own way. She is a quiet babe, content to stare at Nya while her enchanted older sister stares right back.

"Rhaenys, little dragon," Rhae tells them both. "She is your little sister, Visenya. You must love and look out for her."

"Nys," Nya says firmly, gently reaching out to poke her new sister. The babe only blinks.

Robert grins.

Nys and Nya. What a lovely ring to it.

There is no presentation at court for her. Ravens are sent out instead, so that Rhaella and her little girl, and then the Baratheons, might more intimately meet their newest princess.

* * *

Nya grows into a true Baratheon child, big and burly. Robert believes his mother wholeheartedly when she amusingly calls Nya his second coming, only with longer hair. Nya loves climbing over anything and everything, from Robert's lap to the coiled dragon columns. She'll scream up a storm if forced into too constricting a dress, or if hauled away from the ponies in the stables. If Nys so much as whimpers, Nya will viciously kick whatever has made her precious baby sister upset, be it a servant's child or their very caretaker. They lose three septas, that way, because Rhae indulges Nya's protective outbursts and Robert loses all good will when some old harpy suggests 'beating the dragon' out of his oldest.

Nys too has the Baratheon features, though her hair is sleek instead of curly and blue eyes truly indigo. She is a sweet, quiet babe who adores everything soft and cute as she is. With Nya as her shadow, Nys never need fight for what is hers.

When Lord Whent announces what promises to be the tournament of the century at Harrenhal, of course Rhae and Robert must go. They mutually agree to take their daughters with them. Rhae is determined to show their heirs to the kingdom, as a silent statement her children will one day rule too. Robert simply finds their antics amusing, handy entertainment for a boring feast or else useful distractions for a tedious council.

Naturally the crowd cheers their future rulers. Their Silver Princess remains fair as the Maiden, gentle as the Mother, and wise as the Crone. Their Storm Prince, who feels alive only in the wood or the arena, is the Warrior made flesh, now full in his prime.

What a sad sight Aerys makes in comparison. Since Duskendale his nails and bears grow long and unkempt. He is gaunt from fear of poisoning and alone but for his Kingsguard. The throne intended for Rhaella goes empty, for at the last minute he has changed mind to order her and Viserra behind in the capital.

Despite the concerns of his guards Robert refuses to abandon the melee. The risks is what makes it _fun, _gods dammit. He knows he wins that fair and square, considering even the most politically-minded of knights are too preoccupied to hold their blows against their future in such a free for all.

The joust is a necessary evil, because of course Robert must display his full horsemanship and have a chance to crown his queen of love and beauty. To be sure, he has strength on his side, but he is a fair rider, and the lance has never been his weapon of choice. It is mostly size and stubbornness that gets him through his first few rounds. His early competitors are from good houses, to be sure, but not knight renowned for their own virtues.

His victory against Brandon Stark is more from a calm head and sheer dumb luck than anything else. The Wild Wolf, true to his name, has shit defense when he gives it all for trying to know Robert out of the saddle. Perhaps he's trying to impress that pretty little Cat of his up in the stands.

Breaking one lance against gods damned Arthur Dayne is luck. Two is stupidly fortunate and three an outright miracle. Four is where Robert realizes the conspiracy to make the future king look like he can't earn his own glories.

On the fifth, Robert lets himself tumble out of the saddle. The Sword of the Morning freezes in shock. Before Ser Arthur can disqualify himself too, Robert laughs uproariously, lifts off his helm, and concedes the match. "Best win for my wife, Ser Arthur, or the royal bed goes cold tonight!"

He lingers on the side of the arena to watch Ser Jaime Lannister, young and radiant, square off against Barristan the Bold. The lad has most certainly earned his spurs, Robert gives him that, but he is reckless in a way only boys can be. He lasts two rounds, before he topples from his saddle.

"Well done, boy!" Robert roars, clapping the Lannister on the back. To his credit Jaime once more proves more than his pretty face and doesn't buckle. "You're a knight at five and ten, and lasted more than a round against Barristan to boot! Quite the story for your lady love, eh?"

"Yes," Jaime echoes dazedly, though the shock is souring into something else as he glances up to the stands. "Quite a story."

Robert looks up too, grinning for his daughters, and then turns to where a red-haired girl is waving her handkerchief so avidly he's surprised her arm doesn't fly off. He grins. "Don't worry about your Tully girl. She's already over the moon for you."

The young knight starts, as if just realizing his betrothed is more than just polite in her support. Poor boy, he's as thick as Stannis. That's what one gets for growing up with a twin sister only slightly more pretty than he is.

Robert hurries to the royal box. There is no true concern, not while his father is there to talk Aerys down, as only he can. Rhae makes polite conversation with his mother and Stannis, who wears his bruises proud as battle scars. They are proof he won justice for that crannogman from those damned squires, and at last Lady Lyanna's admiration. Renly and Nya watch, wide-eyed, as two of the greatest knights of the Kingsguard clash. Nys, who drifted off hours ago, has long been carried off to nap. Poor little mite's too young to realize this is the stuff of songs.

Nya squeals with delight when he delight when he swings her into his lap.

"Who are you rooting for, little dragon?" he asks her.

"Both of them, Papa," Nys states matter-of-factly. "They're both our knights."

Renly blinks, affronted at his niece. "But Ser Arthur's _the Sword of the Morning!"_

"That he is, Lord Renly," Rhae interjects, near startling Robert out of his seat. "Yet, this not a competition of swordplay, and Ser Barristan won his knighthood on a day much like this."

Both Barristan and Arthur are stubbornly honorable bastards, especially with the eyes of the realm upon them. They ride again and again, until Robert half-expects one of them to just drop dead of sheer exhaustion before the thing will end.

In the end it is the Sword of Morning who topples into the dirt, to a man old enough to be his father. When Arthur Dayne removes his helm, he shakes his head in bemusement, and congratulates his knightly brother on the hardest match of his life.

With the crown of blue roses, Ser Barristan rides up the stands. For a moment, he hesitates, before gallantly riding on. Head bowed, he tilts his lance up to Rhae.

"To you, your grace, for you are our future queen, and already so radiant in your love of the people."

With solemn grace, Rhae accepts the crown. The bright blue of the roses stands out starkly against her hair, turning it near white as frost.

"I accept your crown, Ser Barristan, and pray I will live up to your highest hopes when such a time finally comes."

Aerys scoffs, loudly. All horrified eyes turn to the king, twisted and bitter on his seat. "It'll be all for naught unless you can push out a son, my girl, but the gods have favored you so far like they've done your bitch of a mother."

All the smiles die in the crowd. Robert goes still, though he cannot quite stop himself from shaking. Surrounding him are his father and mother, his wife and brothers. His precious princess sits prone upon his lap. He holds the storm back, so he will not destroy them all.

In a move learned from her mother, Rhae bows her head and does not engage her king. She sits, serene as the Maiden, until her father's temper shift and he demands a proper feast to celebrate this last, heroic feat by Ser Barristan the Bold.

So ends the tourney of Harrenhal, though the wine that drowns down the whispers will not last long beyond this day.

"What a fortunate thing it would be," he later grumbles to his princess in their bed, "if your father were to finally 'trip' over that filthy mat he calls a beard on his way to take a shit tonight."

"No," Rhae says. Her nails dig into his chest like talons. "Not yet."

Robert's hands move to cradle her belly, where their third little one had kicked until naught but weeks before. A miscarriage was not devastating at this stage, the maester had consoled, especially not when this had been Rhae's third babe in as many years. Even a young and healthy woman like her, with so robust a husband with such strong seed, needed time to rest.

"If you're up to it we can try for a boy right now," he offers. "With our spite we shall fuck the manliest prince since fucking Aegon the Conqueror into existence."

This is enough to startle a smile from her. His humor has always been hit or miss with his wife, for around him she need not pour such effort into her appeal. "Soon," she allows dreamily. "When his time comes."

* * *

Rhae settles back into herself once they return to Dragonstone. Robert half expects her to find his bed the night of their return, but her eyes only drift skyward.

He doesn't press the matter. Perhaps she still grieves the babe. To Robert, it had only been the smallest and most secret of bumps, a chance for another little girl to spoil or at last a little boy to hunt and spar with. He knows little of these things, beyond the odd periods of elation and sudden sadness his mother had gone through in the years before Renly, when he had been too young and stupid to guess her pain.

Fortunately, he has the girls to keep him occupied. It is perhaps for the best they lost this third babe before telling the girls they would have become big sisters. Instead, he at last grants Nya the pony she has long begged them for, a stout and shaggy little thing she names Brownie for its coat. Nys gains a felt kitten, for neither Rhae nor Robert feel she is ready for one that will bite and scratch her if she cuddles it too much.

One night, Robert jerks awake with his little girls fast asleep on his lap and the fire burning low. A shape looms out of the dark, pale as a wraith, but is only his wife.

"How would I know I would find you here?"

"Because the girls wanted another Pate story," he grumbles, kissing each of their princesses on the brow as he finally puts them to bed. "The fifth one of night, in fact."

There's a thousand Spotted Pate stories to tell, though of course Robert has to censor all the best ones. The hero of his stories only gets a lady's token or maybe a chaste kiss, never a good roll in the hay, but all are equally preferable to unleashing the bloody family lore too soon. He leaves the stories of Daenys the Dreamer and Aegon and his sisters to his wife, who was raised on such things herself by Queen Mother Shaera.

Rhae spares their daughters only a fond, distant glance before she fixates upon him. Robert shives in dread and anticipation. "Come."

Robert follows like a good husband. He aims for the nearest unoccupied bedchamber, but his princess drags him to a darkened corner first. _Then _that bedchamber, and the three after it, as they finally work their way back to his own quarters.

By the dawn, Robert sags, spent and boneless, when his dragon rolls off him the final time. "I think we overdid it, Rhae. That'll make your father drop dead, though, once you not only pop out one promised prince, but six more on top of him."

"No," she says in short, grim satisfaction. "Only the one, conceived beneath the bleeding star."

Robert knows little about astrology, beyond a few odd bits of natter that have stuck during Rhae's passionate rambles on the subject. Rhae is convinced their last babe was made beneath the tail of a shooting star, as they have apparently just made this one. He remembers her fucking him plenty in the days before and after that, but who is he to judge?

She certainly seeks him out plenty over the next few days, to ensure he truly places a prince in her. Robert's certainly not about to quibble prophecy over it.

By the time their fou- _third _babe comes, winter is dead at last and the true spring has come, growing warm with the promise of imminent summer. While the poor bastards in King's Landing must be sweltering in the stinking heat, Dragonstone is pleasantly warm, windows thrown open to the fresh salt breeze and the smoky stench of the Dragonmont.

"Aegon," Rhae announces in weary triumph. "What better name for a king?"

Robert's thought of at least of them. There are great men like Daeron and Maekar that don't have nearly so many namesakes, or great Targaryen princes like Aemon and Baelon that have never ruled as kings. But it's not his place to protest, and it fits the pattern Rhae has cultivated in their girls.

_Not that you look like an Aegon, _Robert muses, considering the squashed little babe he cradles. He has to fight off a grin when he realizes why that head of dark hair, deep infant blue eyes, and little scowl are so familiar. _You're a little Stannis._

"He is the Prince that was Promised, and his is the song of ice and fire."

Nya and Nys blink up at their mother, then back down at their new baby brother. Robert knows near most of everything must have flown over their heads, no matter how important Rhae believes today to be to them.

"Jon," Nya declares firmly.

"Jon," Nys echoes dutifully.

Robert grins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, Nya is Mya Stone re-imagined as a trueborn princess. And a Rhaenys with a Baratheon look instead of the Dornish. And a Jon who takes after his father this time around, at least in coloring. His eyes will settle on a blue so deep they are almost black, and a build more like Rhaegar's.
> 
> The Baratheon Family Tree (as of 283)
> 
> Lord Steffon Baratheon (246 - ) (m. Cassana Estermont) (244 - )  
\--Robert Targaryen, Prince of Dragonstone (262 - ) (m. Rhaenyra Targaryen, Princess of Dragonstone) (259 - )  
\----Visenya 'Nya' Targaryen (279 - )  
\----Rhaenys 'Nys' Targaryen (280 - )  
\----Aegon 'Jon' Targayen (283 - )  
\--Stannis Baratheon, Heir of Storm's End (264 - ) (b. Lyanna Stark) (266 - )  
\--Renly Baratheon (277 - )


	3. The Queen Mother

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Queen Mother comes into her own.

"That bitch! That spiteful, ungrateful bitch! A stag on my throne! And now his spawn, a stag in dragon's clothing!"

Rhaella sits impassively as her king paces the Great Hall like a caged animal. Spittle flies from his mouth. Tywin Lannister stands unmoved. Aerys hides his terror for his own Hand beneath anger and cutting insults. Yet so too does he cling to him, for the lion is his last and greatest chance of keeping the stags at bay. His small council is stuffed with lickspittles, local lords whose power depends entirely upon the king's good will. That does not stop the more foresighted from also currying favor with Lord Steffon and his sons.

"My contacts assure the young prince is a healthy babe, your grace," Varys reports serenely.

Rhaella no longer keeps the Seven. The Stranger stole so many of her children and has not yet had the grace to put her brother's withered husk out of its misery. Still she is grateful little Aegon is so far strong. She had feared especially for little Rhaenys, born in winter's thrall, but who has now grown into a hale little girl.

"The gods mock me so!" Aerys snarls. "They stole my Jaehaerys before he even breathed and left me with but a bitch and a she-pup. Has my line not honored them the Conciliator? Did my line not give up our consorts and our native gods to embrace them? Am I not the protector of their people!"

There is no religious leader for his baleful eye to fall upon. The past three years the High Septon has spent most of his days in Oldtown. So instead Aerys calls upon the last power in this world he believes in.

"Lord Rossart!"

The Grand Master perks up. "Yes, your grace?"

"It would seem the Father would need reminding of who metes out justice in this land. Fetch me the blackest soul in the cells."

The faces in the hall fall carefully neutral. Most have had three years to toughen their stomachs and harden their hearts. Those that did not had the grace to leave King's Landing swiftly, lest they too be condemned as traitors.

Rhaella swoons in her seat. Her pale purple gown emphasizes the dark shadows beneath her eyes, the tightness to her cheeks. Aerys jeers her way.

"Spare me, sister," he sneers. "Of course you and your frail little heart are excused. Justice is no place for wailing women."

"Thank you, your grace," she says breathlessly. "Your mercy knows no bounds."

Today the condemned is no common cutthroat or poxy whore. The woman dragged out before the court is allegedly Wenda the White Fawn, whose body was never found after the slaying of the Kingswood Brotherhood. She is too withered from captivity and maddened by torture for any to confirm she _isn't _Wenda.

Rhaella gracefully retreats before the alleged Wenda is pried from the black cells. By then she has long made her way to Maegor's Holdfast to dismiss her daughter's septa for the day. Viserra tamps down her grin to a small smile, because she has not yet mastered hiding her emotions so.

"Good morning, mother," she greets brightly. "Did court grow too tedious again?"

"Dreadfully so, little dragon," Rhaella admits. "Your father is very exact in his trials, but I have heard the arguments for this one far too many times these past weeks."

Viserra is a lovely child in her own right, no matter how she is endlessly compared to Rhae. Her eyes are paler lilac, her features more Shaera's than Rhaella's. Her beauty is a gentler one, a rounder one, for Viserra indulges in the sweets sneaked to her. At her age Rhae was a waif, reading through meals instead of eating them. The burdens of queenship will never fall upon Viserra's shoulders. She is a child to be cherished, her innocence shielded for as long as possible.

Together they settle into Viserra's quarters with only a few of Rhaella's ladies for company. Rhaella's youngest adores silks and satins. Rhae mastered sewing only out of necessity, quick putting it aside for her harps and poetry when the septa deemed her acceptable. Viserra flourishes her stitches as Rhae does her music. Even for princesses silk is a delicate, expensive material. At only seven Viserra is skilled enough for Rhaella to allow her a small swatch.

Viserra owns several sachets imported from Lys and Tyrosh. Biting her lip, she labors hours on her own, most especially in embroidering a three-headed dragon. Rhaella provides guidance where she must. She scarcely concentrates on her own project, a blanket for little Aegon. Her ladies fill up the room with good chat. Rona Staunton, a happy widow, sings out a few merry ditties. Emma Edgerton orders servants to wave around incense, for summertime makes the holdfast stink so.

Perhaps Rona's singing is not quite loud enough to drown out the alleged Wenda's screams when the windows are thrown wide open for every scrap of breeze. Perhaps that same wind carries with it the faintest odor of charred flesh and the noxious smoke of wildfire. Viserra is much too engrossed in her sachet to care.

Rhaella beams with pride when she inspects her daughter's progress. "Masterful, little dragon."

Viserra pouts. "Mother, the dragon necks look more like snakes!"

"Surely they must be close kin, my lady," Nessa Hayford protests gently. "Or at least the closest models we have left from life."

"Which makes your effort all the more admirable," Rhaella laughs. "At your age all my dragons came out like fat horses."

Viserra bites her lip before nodding assertively. "It was good practice for the next one, at least. This one shall be my own. I certainly can't give Father snake dragons."

Aerys was no dragon. He is less than the shadow of a snake. But Rhaella bites back her bitterness. Let Viserra cling to her happy memories like Rhae never could. She is a child, hopefully ten years away from when a marriage could ever come to pass. Ten years is a long time for Aerys to meet his gods at last.

Pella, swift and discrete as any good maid should be, brings news of her king's coming long before his arrival. Rhaella thanks her for her notice, bidding her daughter a fond farewell. Viserra scarcely notices her departure. She is already absorbed in her second attempt at the satchet and surrounded by ladies that will never let her want for a woman's companionship.

Rona Staunton breaks into her loudest, brightest songs yet, with even dour Lysa Rollingford humming along.

On the night her brother is made, Viserra is none the wiser to her mother's screams or how her father's beard reeks of shit and smoked flesh.

* * *

Rhaella thinks nothing when she misses her moon's blood. She is near forty, with many a hard birth and miscarriage to her name. The sooner she falls barren, the sooner Aerys will give her bed and his mad hopes of a son.

As days turn to weeks, moon tea flits in and out from her thoughts. All her children are precious. They are (and were) the only parts left of good in Aerys.

She also knows all too well what become of her, should Aerys discover she has flushed his seed from her womb. Already he has disowned his own dead sons and daughters, has sneered the Stranger has only seen justice done so that he might deny his own grief for them all, save poor Jaehaera.

Discretely Rhaella visits Pycelle. She has nothing to fear from the Grand Maester. He is a Lannister man through and through. The lions would happily forsake the Silver Princess and her stag, if they had an infant prince to raise up instead.

Pycelle's snowy brows fly to the peak of his wrinkled head. Perhaps her married ladies require chaperones for his visits, but on his queen even his hands are light and gentle around the endless bruises and bite marks he has treated for years on end. They are the only hands to have known Rhaella so intimately, save her brother's.

"I do believe you are expecting, your grace," he murmurs. "Near seven weeks along, by my estimate."

Unspoken is the fact that Rhaella has not carried a child in seven _years_, when Viserra had near proved her demise. Far healthier mothers than Rhaella have born their husbands broods of babes, only to be laid low by a last one far too late in life. Minisa Tully, Walder Frey's many wives, and even Joanna Lannister all stand as testament to that.

Rhaella accepts his worries and advice with good grace, even if they are just only going through the motions. The gods have stolen her babes before they breathed, before their quickening. If she is to perhaps hold a living babe at all, it will be for mere moments before it succumbs like Aerea. She and Pycelle both come to the quiet agreement to not inform the king until three full moons and the worst of the danger has passed.

Not like their discretion matters in the Red Keep. Not long after Rhaella learns it herself, Aerys barges into her room, laughing as he had not since the Defiance and weeping like he had not since Jaehaera's death. She freezes as he does his best to gently cradle her belly in his gnarled hands. She shudders as he presses his cracked lips to her gown in a reverential kiss and stamps down the impulse to kick him away.

Aerys only breaks out into a grin. "Look at our son, Rhaella! Already quickening!"

Rhaella smiles wanly. "Perhaps, your grace."

All too soon the joy in her brother withers, swallowed by the fear that consumed everything else in him.

The Red Keep's walls are riddled by worms and whispers, Aerys rants. Sedition and secrets simmer in his court. Within a week he has ripped his queen and daughter from their home, bundling them into a ship bound for Dragonstone. His fear for his unborn child cares nothing for the dangers of such a journey. Only on their ancestral seat, where the dragons outlasted the Doom and where Aerys last knew true happiness, will they be safe.

Despite the uneven waves, Viserra slaves over gifts of her own for her nieces, and even stitches a felt dragon for little Aegon. She frets over her atrocious needlework and if Rhae might appreciate such gifts for her children. Rhaella does her best to soothe her fears. It helps dull her own, when she considers Aerys in such close quarters with Robert Baratheon and the grandson he despises.

Aerys has intended for their arrival to be a surprise, but Varys' spies are not the only ones in King's Landing. They disembark to an empty keep and the castellan's earnest regrets the Prince and Princess are not in residence. Princess Rhaenyra feared for her own health and that of Prince Aegon, scarce three moons old, due to certain rumors of sicknesses festering on ships from the Free Cities. She and her family are already en route to Summerhall.

Aerys is simply glad he need not share the isle with their eldest. He settles happily into her bed and her seat, lording over the smallfolk of the isle as he has not since his brief stint as their prince. Of course he sends for his personal court. Master Rossart and his pyromancers thankfully marvel over the Dragonmont and stay far away from the castle.

As a mere woman, Rhaella's own retinue could not be trusted. She must make do with the women of the local minor houses and a few from Driftmark. Viserra is devasted to not have Nys and Nya as playmates. She is allowed no others her age, but at least there are many secret crannies for her to explore, and new techniques to learn from the ladies here in working wool and the weft.

Rhaella contents herself to embroidery from confinement. Kneeling in prayer on cold stone would sap her vitals. Reading would strain her eyes. Too many doting ladies would upset the babe. So would music or boisterous activity.

In that time Rhaella's truest companions turn out to not be her superstitious new ladies, who fear every breath might threaten her future king, but a humble serving woman. She misses dependable old Pella, but Melony is an avid listener, one who never whispers or tiptoes like any loud noise might startle her babe into coming early. She is plain-faced with dull copper hair. This grants Rhaella a discrete companion, for the lords lewd over those girls with the silver hair and deep blue eyes common to the dragonseed.

Melony keeps her head down and reserved with everyone but her queen, so Rhaella comes to know her best. Her neck collars are always conservatively high for the season, as even Dragonstone's summers can grow hot. When her brown eyes catch the firelight, they flash red as the flames themselves.

Yet Rhaella never suffers the bite of poison or a dagger in the dark. A Kingsguard looms at her side day and night, eyes politely glazed when she and Melony indulge in quick, harmless conversation.

With decades of practice, Rhaella averts her gaze, and buries her opinions down deep.

* * *

Viserra's truest friends are those she made herself. She has a whole retinue of ladies in silk, noble knights in leather and even bits of metal armor the smith made them. There is of course her menagerie - felt lions and horses, made all the softer by her stitching them manes of real fur imported from Lorath or the north. Grandest of all is Balerion, big and black. He took up a lot of her time on Dragonstone (and some help from Mother's ladies), but now Viserra has a bedmate that takes up half her bed. If he were a real dragon, then he'd be big enough to fly.

Rhae and her daughters don't count as friends, of course. They're family. Rhae's writing is curly and elegant, almost like spiderwebs, almost too elegant for Viserra to read. Nya is scrawling little letters of her own now. She's a proper little girl now, big enough to play with if she were here. But Viserra hasn't seem Nys or Nya since they were practically babies. Even _Jon _isn't as much a baby now. He's seen his first name day and is toddling around.

Stannis and Robert and Renly are all her cousins, but Father doesn't like her writing to them, so she doesn't. Except to write a letter congratulating Cousin Stannis on his wedding to Lady Lyanna, of course.

Viserra's imagination can make her friends talk and roar. She can move them on her own. The idea of an actual little sibling she could _play _with is vastly more interesting. She's already made them a bunch of blankets and booties and beasts of their own. Even if the baby is still just a bump punching and kicking in her mother's stomach, it should be here any day now.

Father and Lord Tywin and everyone insists it's a boy. Personally Viserra wants a little sister. She misses having Nys and Nya to play dragons with her. She's gotten rather good at making braids too, but boys keep their hair too short for that.

Of course, it isn't up to Viserra - it's Mother's decision, and she only wants the babe to be healthy and happy. So if she's fine with either a prince or a princess, then Viserra is fine with it too.

Dragonstone believes she's still a little girl and not a proper princess. When Mother grows too big, they won't let her visit anymore. Dragonstone keeps its secrets better than the Red Keep, but a prince or princess being born is too big of news to contain. It's even bigger than the storm outside, dashing ships to pieces and shrieking through the glass panes.

Viserra _still _isn't allowed to see the birth, but no one is focused on her anyway. The serving girls run like headless chickens. The septa won't stop praying. So, in a move Nya would be jealous of, she slips out of her room and ducks into that one niche close to Mother's chambers. If she sucks in her belly there's enough room between her and the dragon to make the best hiding place ever.

What Viserra can't see, she hears.

"More rags, damn you, quickly!"

"Should we-"

"No! It's too late, the Queen needs-"

"...Your grace, the Queen and the-"

"Save my son, damn you! Rip him from her if you must! Or I'll-"

Viserra wishes she had Balerion, warm and soft, to cling too. All she is is the great stone dragon in front of her. She clings to the raised ridges made by its scales, as Mother roars and swears and rages like a dragon herself. Viserra has never heard her raise her voice before.

A heartbeat and an eternity later, there is a cry like a kitten's, high and reedy. At first she thinks it's the wind. It's drowned out by her father's laugh.

"My son! At last, my son! My Daemon! This land is his! Yes, I'll make it so, with fire and blood and-"

Viserra sucks in her breath as Father races past, singing and shouting like a boy whose name day has come early. There is the clink of armor and shuffle of feet as a very large amount of people hasten after him, calling "your grace" and "please" with various amounts of alarm.

She should go out and meet her little brother now. She really should. But she can't bring herself to move from her dragon, when the door to her mother's room slams shut and all behind it goes silent.

Some time later, it creaks open again. Viserra tries to crane her around for a peak, any peak, and shrieks when red eyes gaze down into her own.

"Eavesdropping is unbecoming of your stature, my princess," Melony chides gently.

Viserra juts out her chin like Rhae and seizes onto the burning of her indignity. Better soar on fire than drown in a flood of tears. "I'm a dragon, and dragons can do whatever they want."

"Perhaps, princess," Melony allows. "But perhaps dragons also care to meet their new baby brothers?"

Dragons don't cry, so Viserra sucks down her tears and imperiously takes Melony's hand. Her hand is very warm, almost like a hearth, and she doesn't flinch even when Viserra clings so tightly her nails sink in.

Viserra marches down the hall like Queen Visenya going off to battle, like Queen Rhaenyra to dragonflame. When she spots exactly what's in in the bed, she breaks away from Melony with a shameless cry of _"Mama!"_

Mother is awake, Mother is upright, Mother is _alive. _Pale and triumphant as a tourney champion, she smiles at her daughter. Viserra's eager race falters at the lip of the bed, when she considers the bundle Mother cradles close.

"Little dragon," she murmurs, soft and gentle, "come and meet your brother."

Viserra leans just a little closer, to peep at the face nestled into one of the blankets she made. Her brother is just plain ugly, with a pointy head and weird... _bits _flecked to his face. "Nya was prettier," she blurts out. "And Nys was _way _prettier."

She sucks in a nervous breath as soon as she says it, for princesses do not have the same liberties as kings, but Mother only laughs. "You met Nys and Nya after they had time to plump up, little dragon. Give your brother a moon or two, and he'll be just as fine."

Viserra keeps her doubts to herself. "What's his name?" She hopes it isn't Daemon. Maiden help him, her baby brother isn't handsome enough for it.

Mother hesitates, glancing to Melony. The maid dips her head. Something bright flashes beneath her collar as she turns to leave, shutting the door behind her.

"Daeron," she answers at last. "His name is Daeron, for the Good, who brought peace to the realm."

Viserra nods. He looks like a Daeron, all small and ugly.

But ugly in a cute way, she supposes. Just like Nys's ragged, snarly tomcat.

She still hopes she won't have to marry him one day.

* * *

It was an accident, a most unfortunate accident.

Dragonstone is a wonder unmatched in Westeros, not carved from stone but shaped by the lost magics of Old Valyria. It's stairs have always been smooth, and made smoother still by centuries of foot traffic. In the king's haste to announce the birth of his son to the realm he tripped too swiftly for his Kingsguard to rescue him. The rain-slick steps had only made the ascent all the more treacherous.

Aerys is hastened into bed, attended by maesters and septons. His unconsciousness makes him the best patient he has been in decades. He has the best care available, for he insisted on Pycelle coming with them. He had not trusted the Maester of Dragonstone, who had birthed all three of Rhae's babes.

As his sister-wife, a Targaryen herself, the staff of Dragonstone naturally turn to her for guidance. Confined to child bed, she is still queen, mother to a prince not yet a day old. She orders the ravenry watched. There is no need to be overly hasty in sending out the news, when the king's situation is so precarious. With the ships in the harbor splinters or scarcely able to limp onward, relief must come from the capital.

Hours tick by like days. Despite the laborious birth new strength flows into Rhaella when needed most, to command servants and prevent Aerys' lickspittles from rebelling on her. Viserra is relocated to the nursery, she and her brother placed under heavy watch. While Rhae and her family are endless miles away, Rhaella's younger children are very much proof of the power she has claimed. She is a daughter of a king and wife of a king, even if his life is now measured only breaths and half-hearted prayers.

Within a day, the matter comes to a head.

Rhaella does not mourn her brother. His restless shade has only simply found its peace. Outside Dragonstone's walls, Aerys still reigns as king.

The Queen of Westeros sits tall and pride in the bed that has become her throne. Ser Barristan, Seven help him, has been ordered outside the door rather than glaring at her audience. Ruby red eyes meet her respectfully.

"You know you are not the first red priest to have visited my husband's court," she muses silkily. "You have simply presented the most... dramatic argument."

Thoros of Myr had come to court with pretty little tricks derided by Aerys until the man loss faith. Rhaella, however, remembers full well slipping away as pain tore through her being, until fiery hands brought her _back._

'Melisandre,' for she insists that is her true name, bows her head. Her dress is still Melony's humble garb, though her features are exotic, her dull hair now a molten curtain and her beauty great and terrible like a dragon's. Rhaella doubts it her true face, but who is she to judge? She hides the bruises on her neck with high collars and her dark shadows behind powders from her very subjects.

"I am a humble champion of light and life, your grace," she answers humbly. "The flames showed me the truth of your soul, still so bright against all the wicked that has tried to smother you. I could not stand idly by as you bled out beneath my eyes."

Rhaella believes not a word of it. She knows the temptations her own name offers, the power some believe to flow through it. The look in Melisandre's eyes is Rhae's when she speaks of those born amidst the salt and smoke. Yet the same cravings that clearly named Rhae and Rhaella's lives all those years ago has saved her tonight.

It is for the best that none but Pycelle had any reason to believe her cause so dire, that her miraculous recovery can be attributed to her believed piety and the Mother's mercy. Surely the Seven spoke when the good queen recovered her strength, while her wicked brother withered without ever waking?

It is why Daeron shall grow up without his father breathing poison into him as Jaehaerys and Shaera had done into their children. It is why Rhaella is alive, to fight for him where few others will.

Aerys had named their firstborn Rhaenyra, confirmed her and her husband as his heirs. Their son should cement their right. Still, the law decrees the son before the daughter, and Daeron is no more a bastard than Rhae, or the many siblings that followed them.

"If you were a true champion of light and life, then perhaps you should not have thrown us to the flames," Rhaella snaps.

Melisandre's eyes blaze. "Dragons are fire made flesh, your grace. You don't burn."

"Summerhall proved that wrong," she says snidely.

Yet here Rhaella is, through all the fire and blood that has consumed her line. Here is her beloved boy, much belated. Rhae's flame burns bright. She holds her own lands, her own line, bolstered by the Baratheons and Robert while Rhaella was forever tied to a tainted legacy. That name, and Rhaella, are all Daeron has.

The Iron Throne has never been kind to superfluous sons.

The Queen Mother rises from what should have been her deathbed. "Leave me."

With a bow Melisandre's features flicker until she is once more Melony. Rhaella will see her from the island later, for she will not surrender her family once more to the whims of plot and prophecy. However, before the fire she first must see to blood.

Gowned in mourning black, Rhaella summons her children. Viserra comes to her side just as dark, but for the ruby pendant on her necklace. Daeron is swaddled in black and red, a blanket sewn by his sister's own hand. Rhaella wears her queen's crown, silver and pearl.

There will be time for mourning her brother later, once the silent sisters have finished their preparations. First comes the Chamber of the Painted Table. Before the denizens of Dragonstone, where the Conqueror first planned his campaign, Rhaella kneels on her son's behalf.

For a moment Pycelle's gaze searches hers. Rhaella stares calmly back as her son slumbers on. There is precedent here, first set by Grand Maester Gawen and Aenys nigh two centuries before. Here is Pycelle's chance for history. They both think of his true master, just across the bay. Somewhere in Casterly Rock his Tully good-daughter sits heavy with her first babe.

No crown on Dragonstone fits Daeron's little head. The heavy crown of Aerys and Aegon IV would crush his frail body. Instead Pycelle gently lies a circlet of silver, one once worn by a Prince of Dragonstone, across his blankets. Daeron stirs with a soft coo.

She rises as Queen Regent of Daeron, third of his name, King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men.

Beneath the eye of Tywin Lannister, all of King's Landing shall cheer him as such, when he disembarks some weeks later to claim his throne.


	4. The Spurned Princess

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some make peace with their lot in life. Others do not.

By the time the raven from Dragonstone reaches them, Robert and his family have been 'visiting' Storm's End for weeks. Ostensibly they are here for his parents and brothers, so that they might better know their Targaryen relations. Robert happily keeps up the illusion to his girls. They adore Renly so, and little Jon is just coming into an age to start joining in their play. Nya, their eldest, is but five. None of them need to know their mother is on death watch.

When it became clear Rhaella would not miscarry this child, Rhae had ordered them from Summerhall. At least his father's seat was many more miles north, more easily reached by ship and raven. Rhae anticipated the day she would need to immediately sail north for the funeral, certainly for her newest sibling if not the queen herself. She and Robert do not often share chambers anymore. That has not stopped him from hearing of her nightmares, as the dragon dreams or at least her own subconscious haunt her so.

The moment a page announces the letter's arrival, Robert swings Nys off his shoulders, plants a kiss on her head, and races for his wife's side. He is her storm, to rage against their enemies, and her stone, to keep her grounded when her flights of thought mean to carry her off forever into destiny and dream. Perhaps now she needs him more than ever.

Of course she has not waited for him. He finds her in their solar, still as a statue. The envelope has been meticulously opened. The letter is crumbled in her trembling hands. Her amethyst eyes stare right through him, in a future only she can see.

_Good gods, mother and child both? _Rhae has steeled herself for this moment. But certainly no amount of forewarning can brace even a woman grown full losing her mother. Robert thanks the gods every day he still has both his parents. His mother certainly wasn't much younger than Rhaella when Renly was born.

Gently Robert lays his hands upon her shoulders. He says nothing, for there is nothing to be said.

After a lifetime, Rhae reacts to his presence by loosening her death grip ever so slightly slightly. One hand never leaving her shoulders, Robert uses the other to carefully pry the letter from her.

"Fuck me!" he blurts out. No amount of etiquette can prepare a man for learning the wrong dragon has died. Mother and child are both alive and well. Very well, if Rhaella's declaration of herself as Queen Regent for King Daeron, third of his name, had actually been her idea. And not Tywin Lannister's attempt at extending power another few months, until the poor little mite succumbs to his weaknesses like so many older sisters did.

"Fuck him," Rhae chokes out. "He's burning in the deepest of the hells right now for all he did to my mother, and _still _he mocks me!"

Robert falters. He had been fully ready to smash Aerys against his precious throne should he ever threaten his family, but now the bastard has finally met his comeuppance. He cannot fathom turning such rage upon the fragile Queen Mother and an innocent infant. Can he strike down the lion without harming them as well?

He thinks his answer over long and hard. "There can't be a man out there who doesn't agree your father was madder than fucking Aerion the Monstrous, Seven rot their souls. We have grounds for a-"

"No!" Rhae snarls, rounding on him so violently Robert flinches back, lest he harm her. "Never! I am no.... _pretender, _to rip the realm apart!"

Belatedly does Robert remember his wife's full name, the shadow she has lived under since her father's whim condemned her with a name even more tainted than Daemon. She would not be the first Rhaenyra to have her claim upstaged by a brother, nor the first to insist upon on her rights. Or Robert's through her. What did it matter in the end? He was simply the ass to fill the seat she could legally not.

Robert wonders if the realm would ever come to war at all. Surely a Great Council was not unprecedented in a situation like this! His wife had the might of House Baratheon and House Stark behind her, through Lyanna's marriage to Stannis. Perhaps, through Rickard's good-daughter being a Tully, they had even the riverlands too.

Of course, Tywin Lannister is not the only ambitious lord of his time. Hoster Tully had been all too happy to wed his younger daughter to his golden arse of a son. Perhaps the trout lord is tickled by the thought of a queen of his blood, one Lysa has named in her mother's honor. So too is Tywin's girl wed to Jon Arryn's heir. Then there are of course the Tyrells and Martells, who will happily declare for whatever side offers the sweetest reward and....

Robert's head aches at a knotted nightmare of alliances that makes him want to set fire to the whole thing. His duty is to look and sound strong, gods dammit! Politics is fo his queen and his small council.

"Are you certain?" he offers hesitantly. "If we hold our peace now, then we must do so forever."

"Certain as the stars." Rhae settles into her chair like the throne she may now never hold, indirectly or not. "I will not our realm into another Dance, to raze it down where I could instead raise it up. My... our children are destined for greater things than my revenge."

Robert concurs wholeheartedly. The only king he has ever known was one ruled by his whims, who grew only all the more monstrous by the year. He has long dreaded what the Iron Throne might do to him, much less his solemn little Jon. Let the burden be Daeron's instead.

"Dragonstone is still ours," he blurts out. Rhae adores the island so, and Daeron had been the heir for only hours. "For nigh another two decades, at least." Assuming the little king was long for this world, and Dragonstone isn't about to become Jon's instead. "And our children shall always have Summerhall." Tywin Lannister would have to pry it out of his cold, dead hands. The castle was raised for Rhae and Rhae alone. They will not be reduced to helpless royals, dependent on charity.

Rhae smiles in the way that makes him shiver with both dread and desire. "Yes, they always will. Our prince and princesses of summer."

His dragon claims him right then and there. Whether she seeks to drown out rage or grief, or soar upon a higher emotion, Robert can never say. She is his queen. She always will be.

* * *

Rhaella is no stranger to rule. She is the daughter and granddaughter of kings, mother and sister-wife. She learned at the knee of her formidable grandmother, Betha Blackwood, how to turn chivalry and courtesy into her arms and armor. The Kingsguard that averted their eyes when her king claimed his rights now fall over themselves to protect her and her son.

Rhaella puts her powders and high collars aside. Lords and knights alike flinch at her scars, signs of their failure to protect her. Now she wears them as symbols of pride. She has survived Aerys and his madness. The fallout of his reign shall not consume her. Nor shall it take their youngest.

The ladies and septas accept her regency unflinchingly. She has long been their champion, who has pushed for almshouses and patronage of the septries. Regardless of her personal faith, she has refused to allow Aerys' madness to consume her as it had him, and done what good she could. When Aerys' whims had shifted like the sea and Tywin's generosity extended no further than the favors it gained him, the court calls her their good queen, their pious queen. What Rhaella lacks in hard power she has cultivated in soft, to slowly but surely wear away the edges of opposition.

In truth the realm has known a Queen Regent in living memory. Queen Shaera had so often ruled on her brother's behalf, even when he had been in the state to sit the throne himself. Her mother has been dead long enough for Rhaella to accept the part she played in keeping the realm stable enough to not turn against their dynasty completely. It is a precedent Rhaella neatly slides into.

Tywin remains Daeron's Hand, of course, but even Rhae acknowledges Rhaella as regent. She is of impeccable blood, impeccable claim. Who else can claim to be more neutral than she, when the great two claimants of the Iron Throne are both her beloved children?

Aerys' small council of sycophants is a festering wound happily purged by both sides. Its filling becomes symbolic of the delicate dance maintaining peace. If Tywin is Hand of the King, then surely Cousin Steffon must be her Daeron's master of laws. Wise Pycelle is balanced by Eldon Estermont as master of ships. Ser Gerold Hightower and mild Gyles Rosby are compromises in their neutrality. So too is Varys, reluctantly irreplaceable.

Every voice on the council, much less those in court, wants a part in shaping Daeron the Young. If Tywin brings strength and unbreakable pride, then so does Cousin Steffon bring justice and compromise. Septons urge piety and humility, maesters patience and temperance. Rhaella is simply there for her son when all else threatens to overwhelm him. She is his safe harbor, the one place where he might cry and rant and run his mouth like a boy should.

Excepting Viserra, of course. She is Daeron's companion and confidant, true and constant through the uncertain days of his regency. Daeron clings to her as he can no other. Rhaella does not fear their relationship. Viserra, even as she grows into maidenhood, only regards her brother with platonic affection that never sparks into something _lustier, _as their father's had. Viserra desires neither her brother's crown nor his hand, only his happiness.

Viserra weds her betrothed when she is past six and ten, for Rhaella shall never see a daughter of hers wed as a child. In truth her and Daeron's fates were decided on long ago, more easily than the small council. Of course, Mace Tyrell took far longer to deliberate on her proposal than Tywin had. His silence covered enough time for a raven to reach Summerhall and fly back with a rejection. This is how Viserra weds Loras Tyrell, while Margaery remains yet unmatched.

Despite the family she married into, Lysa Lannister is a sweet and guileless girl, one content over her brood of lions. Minisa, her eldest, is thankfully no Joanna come again. Her hair is lustrous red-gold and she has the high cheekbones of the late Minisa Whent. Her eyes are neither blue nor deep green, but like Tywin's, pale green flecked gold. Hoster and Tywin both have tried to make their mark upon her, with Genna Lannister and Catelyn Stark as early influences. Rather than let the girl fall to Cersei Arryn, Rhaella takes the girl on her own cup bearer. She does not stay long in the capital, for she journeys south to Highgarden with Viserra instead. When she weds Daeron upon their majority, so will the tradition of incestuous marriages in the main line come to an end.

Viserra is a good daughter, a capable lady skilled in domestic arts and charming courtiers. She has never known the hardships Rhae has, that any queen will face.

Rhae would have been capable caretaker to both Daeron and Minisa. She was born and raised to rule. But she has washed her hands of court and graciously denied Rhaella's requests to aid in the regency. She spends most of her days secluded in Summerhall, save for the odd trip across the narrow sea or the Hightower. She insists she is focused upon her own children and her own lands.

The Summer Princess, the realm charitably calls her, for she never ventures far enough north now to know true winter. She remains just as fair, but also just as ephemeral, for so many of the powers that once gathered around her have flocked to Viserra in Highgarden instead. Or Daeron, as he increasingly grows into himself.

More snidely whisper she is the Spurned Princess, stewing in all the perceived wrongs done to her like a rejected suitor. But those are rumors not for Rhaella's ears.

Not a single one of Rhaella's grandchildren have yet been betrothed. It is certainly not Steffon and Cassana's influence. Stannis and Lyanna are at least open to letters sent on their daughters' behalves, though they have made it clear it will not be many years until they seriously consider proposals.

Rhaella knows why. But none of her court suspect. When they speak of the beauty and virtues of their own children, when hers are all spoken for, she accepts their gushing with serene smiles and reminders the Princess of Summerhall is matriarch of her own line.

It is not Rhaella's place. She has her own child to still worry about, after all, one younger than even Aegon. Daeron had been such a shy and quiet boy, wracked by nightmares brought on by the stress of his reign and the expectations heaped upon his shoulders.

His smiles come more easily now, and the eloquent words that prove himself more than a puppet, for he patronizes charities and good works as no king since Aegon V had. He knows better than to push for the rights of the lower classes as the last Aegon had, for Tywin has certainly ensured Daeron sees the smallfolk just as that, children in need of his protection and without capacity to make such decisions for themselves.

Daeron confides of no more nightmares, not to her or to Viserra. It puts Rhaella's unease to rest, that at least one king will escape the swings of mood that claimed countless kings before him.

* * *

"T-That... spiteful, ungrateful _little bitch! _I should have..."

Robert stands on in bemusement as his wife starts ranting in a dozen languages, most especially High Valyrian. She always had ranted with more eloquence than she had in bed. Harwood Fell's wife screams out whole ballads in the throes of passion, or so he's heard when they're both in their cups. Rhae makes the short, curt commands any leader would out on the battlefield.

He knows it's coming, but still blinks when the dragon turns her wrath on him. Thank gods his queen only has the spirit of one, or he'd be burning more than in his loins right now. "Did _you _know of this?"

"Nope," he answers blankly.

Because he is far from surprised about it. They had both indulged their little Nya, who was both the blood of Elenei and Visenya Targaryen. Of course she had seized what she wanted in the end, gods or dragon-mothers be damned.

Her violet eyes blaze. "You talked me into letting her go out to the Felwood."

Robert rolls his own eyes back, very much wishing for a pitcher of wine. A whole gods damned barrel of it. "You would've let her go anyway. She's ridden these woods to death and you expected her to come back like a good little lapdog to marry her own fucking brother."

Rhae's fire flushes with the fire she cannot breathe. Because she had been to buy Nya the gods damned sand steed with the speed and stamina to reach the crownlands so quickly. She had Robert's way of making friends, but Rhae had given her the eloquence to convince men and women alike to ride with her into hell. Or at least convert her guard into conspirators.

Not that Beric Dondarrion would have needed much wooing. Robert has swung out his war hammer more than once to chase lovers from her window. Nya had climbed out to meet the bravest (and stupidest) of them anyway.

The letter in Rhae's hands is either shreds or ashes in the hearth, but Robert's heard enough to understand the fucking usurpation his daughter has pulled out. "Your brother's a downright sap, Rhae. Of course he bought Nya's tears, whether she did it out of real love or just a real desire to not marry her fucking baby brother. What's more important is that your mother's gone along with it, and the High Septon has acknowledged their marriage in the eyes of gods and men. So, how are we to handle this?"

He has no hope Rhae will heed Daeron and Rhaella's pleas for tearful, earnest reconciliation with their daughter. He just hopes Rhae will ignore them in a snit that's lasted since Daeron had the audacity to pop out with a cock and then refuse to keel over for it.

"Write your parents," is her order. "They deserve to see at least two of their grandchildren properly married."

Robert clenches his fists. Jon has just turned thirteen. Nys is sixteen and without a bad bone in her body, for Nya had always been there to defend her.

But he gave up the name Baratheon for a crown he'll now never see, and his children carry the wrong name.

He bows his head bitterly. "Right away, your grace."

He storms from the room, the dragon's gaze boring into his back long after he leaves her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You know how Mya Stone has great hopes and dreams in canon? Guess who got a double sense of entitlement in this life, and every bit of encouragement from her parents to do as the first Visenya would have done.

**Author's Note:**

> Given the ominous vagueness of what went down at Summerhall, and some rather alarming hints about Aegon V's mental state at the end of his life... Yeah, shit went down there. 
> 
> Also, given Jaehaerys and Shaera's lack of further children and Rhaella having one named stillbirth and no info given about the other... Yeah, inbreeding with your siblings when your ancestors fucked around with dragons and blood magic can have consequences. Aerys' hype around a 'Viserys' is loosely inspired by a hype train that crashed and burned when that son Henry VIII and Ann Bolelyn crowed about popped out a princess instead.
> 
> The Targaryen Family Tree (as of 278)
> 
> King Aerys II Targaryen (244 - ) (m. Rhaella Targaryen) (245 - )  
\--Rhaenyra 'Rhae' Targaryen, Princess of Summerhall and Dragonstone (259 - ) (m. Robert Targaryen, Prince of Dragonstone) (262 - )  
\--Jaehaerys Targaryen (stillborn 267)  
\--Daenaera Targaryen (269 - 270)  
\--stillborn (270)  
\--Aerea Targargaryen (272 - 273)  
\--Jaehaera Targaryen (274 - 274)  
\--Viserra Targaryen (276 - )


End file.
